“Apple Computer’s famous ‘1984’ commercial, which introduced the Macintosh, wasn’t the only computer ad that aired then. It’s just the only one that changed people’s lives – particularly people who already loved technology,” Kevin Maney reports for USA Today.
“‘It was like I had discovered gold,’ says Jon Staenberg, another venture capitalist. He was so pumped by the Mac back then, he went to work at Microsoft, which would try to replicate the heart of the Mac’s magic: its graphical user interface, known as a GUI (and pronounced ‘gooey’). That effort became Windows,’ Maney reports.
“Twenty Super Bowls later, many tech industry leaders say the ad and the first Mac played an inspiring role in their career paths. It was one of those rare bolts of lightning that can mobilize a generation in a particular field – the way John F. Kennedy’s call for a man on the moon motivated the aerospace crowd, or Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein rallied young journalists with their Watergate investigation,” Maney reports. “The Mac was definitely a breakthrough. It made computing simple for non-techies. Several Mac aficionados told me it compares with the first jet airliner, the Boeing 707, which revolutionized air transport and influenced the entire range of jets we fly today.”
Maney writes, “Makes sense, but somehow the scale seems too large. The Mac made computing truly personal. It made an inaccessible process human. It was, perhaps, more like the arrival of the telephone in an era when communications happened by Morse Code tapped over telegraph lines. Or the first Kodak camera in 1888, bringing photography to the masses at a time when the art required fragile equipment and harsh chemicals.”
“But Apple famously blew its chance to dominate computing. ‘Ironically, it’s now a niche machine for graphics snobs, and Windows is what ‘the rest of us’ use,’ says Tom Evslin, who developed software for the first Macs and now runs telecom company ITXC,’ Maney reports. “There are whole books and business school studies about why that happened. But Jeff Hawkins – whose wife worked at Apple in 1984, and who was influenced by the Mac when he created the Palm computer – traces the seed of the problem to that ‘1984’ ad.”
“‘The drones in the ‘1984’ ad (symbolize) the very business people that would soon determine the future of the PC industry,’ Hawkins says. ‘From the start, Apple alienated them,’ Maney reports.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: “Ironically, [the Mac is] now a niche machine for graphics snobs, and Windows is what ‘the rest of us’ use,” according to Tom Evslin who now runs telecom company ITXC. Tom’s bio page at ITXC’s website is here. Unfortunately, his email address seems to be unavailable. Perhaps you’d like to send him one of our T-shirts that is especially apropos for Tom, instead?
Ironic that the article is in USA Today. The famous graphics that changed the look of newspapers all over the world were “Made on a Mac”. I know this to be true as I bought and read the very 1st issue of USA Today when it came out. The editor said as much.
Gee, who would’ve guessed that my mother, a potter of modest means with a 10-year-old 12″ TV and dial-up internet, was secretly a caviar-and-champagne guzzling Gucci-set graphics snob?
Fact is that mere months after replacing her 5th Wintel PC with an iMac she was mousing around like nobody’s business, had a website, and was maintaining her own client database. Not only that, but the peer-group tech support she had always relied on and feared losing became almost completely unnecessary.
USA Today isn’t known as McPaper for nothing. Or, rather, it is known as McPaper for nothing, because nothing is exactly what it offers as nutritional value.
I am designing a system for one middle sized company at the moment. It will be 100% Micro$oft free and will cost about 100 000� (hardware+software+licenses for one year).
It will run comblete ERP/HR/CRM/SFA/POS-systems for that company under Os X. With Apple they can actually save nice amount of money every year and it it’s cheaper to buy than that size PC-system. I will post details about that in June when it will be running.
“niche machine for graphics snobs”. Right. It’s also a platform for people who want a stable, virus-free, spyware-free, easy to use machine which just works. Oh – and don’t forget the “Unix snobs” who carry a powerbook instead of a PC w/Linux.
People who run Windows are either conformists or clueless. I don’t want to be in either group.
Long ago, Plato found the explanation for Microsoft;
“…None of the gods love wisdom or desire to become wise, for they are wise already — nor if someone else is wise, do they love wisdom. Neither do the ignorant love wisdom or desire to become wise; for this is the grievous thing about ignorance, that those who are neither good nor beautiful nor sensible think they are good enough, and do not desire that which they do not think they are lacking…”
– Plato, Symposium 203E-204A
Graphics snobs eh? Maybe he should head on over to Virginia Tech and talk to the graphics snobs who built the world’s 3rd fastest computer using Macs.
The only point that rang true in the article was the one about alienating the business crowd that would eventually run IT. Even though that 1984 depiction was true, those hopeless drones didn’t need to have it pointed out that they were hopeless drones. Now there is an ABA (anyone but Apple) attitude in big business that will be very difficult to overcome – not insurmountable, just difficult.
Yeeeeees (Morpheus voice from the first Matrix on the phone with Neo the first time).
I agree with Plato.
And I forgot to mention that company doesn’t do any graphics’s it is a retail company.
Hey! I love that “Macs are great for graphics” shirt – I just bought the baseball shirt version, but I’m keeping it for myself, not sending it to Tommy Boy!
One guy from Finland:
I look forward to your follow up story on your OS X installation. This is the kind of real world examples that we should email to these companies every time one of their “analysts” spew forth their ignorant bilge water.
MSN should also post your results as a story to counter the FUD from the Wintel drones.
“Graphic snobs”! Frankly I am offended by these stupid “journalist snobs'” irresponsible remarks. My wife uses a LCD iMac and she is not even in the graphic profession! Like I mentioned many times before, nowadays there are so many low standard and irresponsible “journalist snobs” out there knowingly spreading wrong ideas, bigotry, propaganda for M$ without being accountable for. That’s just pathetic!
Sent the following email to the alleged journalist at kmaney@usatoday.com:
Bigoted comment #1:
“(The Mac is ) now a niche machine for graphics snobs.”
[Continued from my above post] She marveled at the Mac’s common-sense interface and suddenly enjoyed using a computer. And, at $699 it cost no more than a similarly-configured Wintel PC. She�s had it for three years and will probably use it for another five, thanks to its full compatibility with the very latest version of OS X. How�s that for return on investment?
Bigoted comment #2:
“He’s obviously been hanging out with the French too long.”
Dude, what is your problem? How do you get from slagging the Mac to slagging the French? Are you actually suggesting that the French are the only people who lust after fashion models? Or, do you mean to imply that only models who pose for non-French companies are worthy of desirous attention? I don�t get the logic.
On reflection, I do get the logic. You�ve got this whole class-warfare thing going on in your head, and you don�t even realize it. In your mind an elegant, high-quality product = French = aristocracy = snobism. You think that Windows users are the salt of the earth because they slog and toil with lousy, crashing, insecure, labor-intensive machines, kind of like Yugo drivers, and that Mac users, because you never see them sweat, are overprivileged silver-spoon elitists. Well, how�s this for class warfare: The wealthiest man on the planet, just like the oil, steel and railroad robber barons of the 19th Century, abuses his monopoly power to eliminate choice, hijack standards, impose ever-more-intrusive contracts, and strong-arm millions of small business owners into forking over even more money for products that will cost them billions in down-time and lost or stolen data. Now that�s what I call aristocratic excess, and it�s exactly the kind of behavior that prompted Congress to pass the Sherman Antitrust Act over a hundred years ago. If there�s a friend of the average Joe in the computer industry, it�s Apple.
Your biases are not only obvious as Hell, but pathetic and wholly inappropriate in the field of journalism. Start acting like a professional.
Jacques Cornell
Majikthize:
Well done, sir! Bravo!
…”Majikthize:
Well done, sir! Bravo!”…
Definitely 😎
Actually it is good to be alienated. My take is that “graphic” people are actually those who use both hemispheres of the brain. This only occurs in 5% of the population mostly due to social and educational pressures which cause hemisphere development to atrophy during early development.
So when they say only a 5% (or so) market share, it is not a comment about Apple, but more of an indication (one of many) of the state of the world, that 95% of the people are indeed half wits. Should we worry about that? No, like Plato said we are already there, those who don’t realize it don’t miss it. I mean, how many of you are pissed off because you are not telepathic hmmmm?
So go out there, and live a good and happy life, which is 100% dependant on you, not the computer you or you neighbour owns.
One other guy here in Finland wrote that iPod’s are toys because they are so fashionable. I was so angry to him that I wrote: “Do you really think that everything must be as ugly as you?”. Okay that was not nice. What I can’t understand even that I use every part of my brain is.. Why?!
If something is functional, secure, easy to use and beautiful is considered to be a toy or niche ?
There is so many ugly things in this world and people buys so much shit that there should be a penalty for that!
QUOTING ‘ONE GUY FROM FINLAND”
” am designing a system …100 000� (hardware+software+licenses for one year)… ERP/HR/CRM/SFA/POS-systems for that company under Os X….it will be running”
One Finland Guy: which software are you using to develop this and which mac models?
I am currently developing a Accounting/CRM/Inventory system for a client and I am using FileMaker Pro. Dude, this software rocks… No wonder it is an Apple subsidiary.
Majikthize: I hate to tell you this, but Bigoted comment #1 was a quote from someone else, not the journalist’s words.
As for the “French” remark, I got it. You didn’t. I know you don’t want to hear it, so I won’t bother explaining.
Kenny,
By gum, you’re right about the “snob” line – it was a quote, but one that Kevin Maney chose to include without substantiation, challenge or context. A good journalist does not use a quote from Pol Pot on the appropriateness of genocide without questioning its veracity and providing background.
As for the French thing, what’s to get?
“‘[The Mac] was gorgeous, and she did things that I didn’t think were possible. But in the end, I realized she was like an Yves Saint Laurent model – stunning, yet ridiculously out of my league and hopelessly impractical, to boot. Don’t get me wrong; I wanted her desperately.'”
“He’s obviously been hanging out with the French too long.”
Sounds to me like a backhanded insinuation that French people a) like things that are unrealistic and impractical, and b) have an abnormal fascination with models. Alternatively, he could be saying that the speaker’s fascination with Yves Saint-Laurent models in particular comes from “hanging out with the French too long,” with the corrollary implication that other (non-French?) models are more appropriate objects of desire.
The only reason he included the line was that the YSL reference created an opening for him to use a crass and politically manipulated prejudice among Americans against the French to pigeonhole the Mac. Both sides of that equation are repugnant.
If you have a different interpretation, please let us know what it is. I’ve reread the article several times, and I just can’t see how the French reference isn’t a throwaway slur.
Majikthize: I pegged you as unreasonable, but I obviously misjudged you.
I believe the French thing has nothing to do with models or computers. The wording of the quote reminds me of a stereotypical Frenchman’s monologue TV’s golden years. Openly sexual, self-deprecating, in touch with feelings, and with a tendency to talk about inanimate objects as if they were women (and probably vice versa). Think of a Frenchman on Gilligan’s Island.
I was laughing at the quote even before I got to Maney’s remark. I it’s a ridiculous stereotype, and therefore worthy of ridicule, but I don’t see any real insult to the French. I was laughing at Hollywood and poor dialog more than anything.
I found the article to be mostly even handed and harmless. Then again, I’m not French. I *am* a Mac user, though, and found nothing offensive beyond the “graphics snob” line, and I must admit that is a stereotype that I myself hold. Pubs is a longtime Mac stronghold (their strongest), and so people identify the Mac with desktop publishing.
And we all know that Mac users can be somewhat self-righteous, or even zealous. Maybe that’s why that guy thinks graphics people are snobs. I have acted like a snob myself, whenever some accounting geek brings me a “document” they did themself. Ever see a proposal layout done entirely in Xcel?
I’m not really defending the snob remark, but I found it more fun than offensive.
fef,
Long story short… That system will have these kind of things…
Software: Hansa Financial with all modules (ERP/CRM/POS etc) + Adobe and Apple software
[url=http://www.hansaworld.com]http://www.hansaworld.com[/url] (European company)
Hardware: xServe G5’s +xServe Raid’s + G5’s + POS machines iMac’s + Epson printers and scanners. And so on…
I would like use SAP for this. That is not bossible unfortunately, because they don’t have software that runs under Os X for small and midlle sized companies. I am not devoloping everything from the scratch. I only connect different databases together and so on using existing software and check that all the hardware (like cash drawer works with iMac) is compatible and works with everything.
Kenny,
Thanks for the explanation. Guess I didn’t watch enough TV as a kid. I can see your point, though I’m not ready to give the writer that much credit. The “graphics snob” thing is a cheap shot that ignores the reality of the Mac market – the various iMacs have been such a big hit precisely because they make computing easy for neophytes.
My interpretation is that of a reader who’s pretty wound up about all the “elitism” barbs tossed at Mac users and the shameful French-taunting of nationalistic demagogues. It’s a cranky stand to take, but there’s a lot to be cranky about, and I’ll stick by it. Thanks for letting me look through your rosy glasses, though.
Majikthize: You know, you may be right. I do tend to stay on the sunny side. I am a graphics snob, and pretty proud of it. I have a lot in common with that Frenchman on Gilligan’s Island, too.
Speaking for all graphics snobs, we really don’t need defending. We’re above it all, you know. Most Mac users probably are, too. These little journalistic choices are like virii in that they are obviously bad, but don’t really effect us because we’re above all that (standing on our Mac platform). I wouldn’t dare speak for the French, but I would be surprised if they cared.
Of course, there are some very vocal individuals who would disagree, and they all read MDN.
Translation: “I don’t have any taste and I’m angry with those who do”